Assess and Improve My Skills

Developing a connection with the workforce professionals at IowaWORKS Centers provide a number of benefits including:

access to no-cost training and workshops

opportunity to earn training certificates

access to career and skills assessments

coaching and assistance in writing a resume

assistance with completing electronic applications

personal assistance in locating employment opportunities in your desired field

Skill Upgrades and Training Services

Skill upgrades and training services are targeted to move workers into post-secondary educational pipelines and career pathways to enter into and advance in good jobs in high growth and emerging occupations. Training services are provided by training providers on Iowa's Eligible Training Provider List. Eligibility requirements must be met to qualify for these services. To determine eligibility, contact your nearest IowaWORKS Center.

ACT WorkKeys®

ACT WorkKeys® is a job skills assessment system that helps employers select, hire, train, develop and retain a high-performance workforce. This series of tests measures foundational and soft skills and offers specialized assessments to target institutional needs.

Successful completion of ACT WorkKeys® assessments in Applied Mathematics, Locating Information and Reading for Information can lead to earning ACT's National Career Readiness Certificate (NCRC), a portable credential earned by more than 2.3 million people across the United States. If you are interested in taking the NCRC assessments, you may schedule a time at one of the IowaWORKS Centers. The calendar of testing times and locations is available on the IowaWORKS website.

ACT Curriculum

ACT Curriculum is a comprehensive program that brings together courses from both ACT KeyTrain and the ACT Soft Skills Suite.

The program offers an integrated approach to exploring careers and their skill requirements and builds life-literacy through lessons about financial awareness, job searching and more.

O*Net Resources

O*NET is the United States’ primary source of occupational information. Its database contains information on hundreds of standardized and occupation-specific descriptions and is continually updated. O*NET OnLine is the interactive application for exploring and searching occupations. The database is also the basis for Career Exploration Tools, a set of valuable assessments for job seekers and students looking to find or change careers.

LearningExpress™ Library

LearningExpress Library provides a comprehensive selection of academic and career-related resources available in one platform. It includes academic skill building in reading, writing, math and science. It also offers standardized test preparation, soft skills training, job search and career advancement, college admissions test preparation, professional licensing and certification test preparation, high school equivalency test prep and much more.

Maximize Your Potential: Workshops

Maintain a Positive Attitude

The “secret sauce” of having a successful job search is not only in the steps you take, but also in the attitude and mindset with which you take them. This workshop provides a foundation for your job search: how to stay positive during your search.

Develop Career Plan

Building short- and long-term career plans based on skills and interest assessments can help you create a career plan designed to succeed. This workshop covers how to find out what is important to you in planning your career and will expose you to the tools necessary to put that plan into action.

Research Industry Trends

Exploring online resources on employment trends, occupational requirements and opportunities for training and education to enhance skills is a challenge. Knowing where to go to get the most accurate information can mean the difference between hours wasted and time invested. Participate in this workshop to make sure you are spending your research time as wisely as possible in supporting your job search.

Create a Great Resume

One of the the key skills to obtaining a job is the ability to craft resumes and cover letters that target employers' needs. In this workshop, learn how to identify those needs and write resumes and cover letters that position your applicant package to be among those that move to the the next phase in the hiring process.

Conduct a Job Search

Conducting an effective job search isn't just about maintaining a positive attitude, sticking to your career plan, conducting effective industry research and crafting strong resumes. Learning how to target opportunities and effectively network through this workshop, you can explore and tap into the "hidden job market."

Interview and Negotiate

In this workshop you will learn and practice effective strategies to promote experience, education, and accomplishments and answer difficult interview questions.

InterviewStream

Through video interviewing technology, InterviewStream offers job seekers, students and employers a comprehensive solution to prepare for job interviews by creating a no-pressure environment to practice and review skills. In addition, it maintains the human touch of recruiting and hiring while creating a more efficient process that saves time and money.